Prior approaches utilize a team using blasting pots, which are kept outside the water tower, with a line running inside the tower while the operator is suspended via harness. This method is very time consuming as the operator can only media blast small sections at a time and must continually readjust the harness when moving to a new section. Not only is this very time consuming and dangerous, but injuries are extremely common using this method. Down time for the water tower is often eight weeks, which means the municipality in question must either deal with lower water pressure, or a special pump truck must be brought in to keep water pressure up while work is being performed, which can be very expensive for small municipalities with only one water tower, and also for larger municipalities who may have several towers undergoing work, necessitating the rental of multiple pump trucks to keep pressure at tolerable levels for residents.                U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,311,162 and 6,742,617 (Jeswine, et al.) disclose apparatuses and methods for traversing compound curved and other surfaces. A traction unit capable of traversing and turning on surfaces that include compound curves like the surface of a sphere or are inverted like a ceiling. The traction unit includes a plurality of trucks operable to propel the unit across a surface and a plurality of adherence members operable to releasably secure the unit to the surface. In operation, the adherence members cyclically attach to and release from the surface as the trucks propel the unit across the surface. Within each cycle, after the unit has traveled a predetermined distance relative to an attached member, the member releases the surface and reattaches to the surface at a different point.        U.S. Pat. No. 7,194,334 (Laski) discloses a method of washing a contaminant from a surface via a robotic arm. A robotic wash cell including a six-axis robotic arm and end effector equipped with nozzles that spray unheated, solvent free, pure water at high-pressure to clean or debur objects by maintaining the nozzles in close proximity and substantially normal to each surface being cleaned or edge being deburred. The robotic cell wash is particularly useful for cleaning contaminants such as oil and grease from items having more complex shapes. The six-axis robotic arm positions the nozzles and their sprays substantially normal to each surface being cleaned or deburred. The nozzles produce a multi-zone spray pattern with a continuous effective cleaning zone. A water recycling and pressurizing system collects the used water, separates out the oil and grease contaminants to a level of about 5 ppm, and pressurizes the pure water to about 3,000 psi for washing operations or about 6,000 psi for deburring operations.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,441,443 (Roberts) discloses an apparatus for blast cleaning surfaces disposed at angles within 45° of vertical. A blast cleaning machine which gravity feeds abrasive material when blasting at positions from angularly upward to angularly downward. The machine includes a housing, a blast assembly, a motor for rotatably driving the blast assembly and a hopper. The housing has a blast corridor, a return corridor and a blast opening communicating with the blast corridor and the return corridor. The blast assembly receives abrasive material from the hopper and propels the abrasive material through the blast corridor and blast opening against the surface to be blast cleaned. The hopper has straight walls which are substantially parallel with the blast opening for gravity feeding abrasive material straight into the blast assembly. The walls of the hopper provide effective gravity feeding of abrasive material to the blast assembly when the machine is blasting anywhere between a 45° angle upward and a 45° downward.        U.S. Pat. No. 5,545,074 (Jacobs) discloses A closed-environment wet-abrasive blasting system includes a vacuum device for recovering a waste stream of water, abrasive particulate and surface debris. The waste stream is filtered resulting in cleaned water recycling through the system. During operation, water is pumped from a water holding tank to a blast head. Also, abrasive particulate is forced from canister to the blast head. The abrasive material and water form a blast stream which impacts on a surface to treat the surface. The blast head is held to the surface during use by the suction force and defines a work volume over the surface under treatment. In effect, the blast head defines a closed environment in which abrasive particulate water and surface debris do not escape into the surrounding environment, but instead is captured. The vacuum force pulls the surface debris, abrasive particulate and water (i.e., waste stream) from the blast head along a vacuum hose into a recovery tank. There the waste stream accumulates while air passes on to the vacuum. As the waste accumulates, the level rises to a filter. The filter passes air and water, and substantially filters out the abrasive material and surface debris leaving the abrasive particulate and surface debris in the recovery tank. The water and air pass into the water holding tank. The air is pulled into the water recovery tank through a screen that breaks air bubbles up into smaller air bubbles.        
Therefore, a need exists for enabling an operator to safely and more efficiently perform the cleaning and painting of the interior and exterior of large storage tanks and structures, particularly water towers, more efficiently and reduce system downtime during said cleaning and painting.
The object of the present invention is to decrease water tower downtime, thus reducing the cost to the municipality in having to rent special equipment to maintain water pressure while work is being performed, and increase operator efficiency by not requiring said operator to constantly readjust the work harness. These repeated adjustments can cause injury if the operator is fatigued and the harness is not set up properly, and eliminate the need for operators to be inside the water tower, or standing on a scaffold attached to the outside for long periods of time, reducing fatigue and risk of injury to the operator.
Another object of the present invention will provide for cost, and time savings to the operator as less time is required to perform the same amount of work, as fewer workers are needed onsite and faster turn around time.